


Like Real People Do

by Mischiefkingwinkyface



Series: Bad things happen bingo - good omens [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Crowley Whump, Hurt Crowley, Hurt/Comfort, Immortals, M/M, Mortality
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2020-05-15 07:26:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19291021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mischiefkingwinkyface/pseuds/Mischiefkingwinkyface
Summary: The Apocalyse has been averted and Aziraphale and Crowley thought it was happily ever after. It seems that sometimes things don’t always end like a fairy tale.





	1. I had a thought, Dear, however scary.

Aziraphale was an angel who loved a lot of things. He loved old books, and food, music, and dancing. Even more so than his material loves, he loved love. Loving someone and being loved in return is a very human thing but, then again, Aziraphale is a very human angel.

Crowley loved just as much as Aphiraphale sometimes, but not quite in the same way. The demon loved that his care would never break as long as it was in his care, he loved that his plants have such a great fear that they would always grow perfectly. Above all of his selfish loves, he loved one very human angel.

“You simply must try this, Crowley! The cake here is heavenly.” Aziraphale covered his mouth with a suppressed giggle, “we actually don’t have so delightful upstairs. This is much better.”

Crowley considered refusing the offer but, upon being given another pleading look from his companion, decided that it would be more convenient (and definitely not kinder) to simply taste the cake being pushed in his direction. Placing down the glass that had so far, that evening contained unknown quantities of very expensive alcohol, Crowley allowed himself a taste of the cake being pushed towards him and nodded in agreement, “You are very much right, angel, much better than anything from Hell.”

This answered seemed to please Aziraphale as the angel’s cheeks blushed a rather appealing shade of pink. This was not an uncommon occurrence during conversations with Crowley. In fact, there was a period of time where Crowley was almost convinced this was his permanent colouring, around the 1960’s if he recalled correctly.

“We shoulder have a plan really. Where to go next after, ya know, after saving the world and stuff.” Crowley had waited until Aziraphale had gone back to enjoying his cake before mentioning the apocalypse that has just been very narrowly avoided. He especially did not want to admit to the recent side affects from the time stopping stunt he had somehow managed to pull off.  
One thing you should know about Crowley is that he doesn’t mind asking for help to get himself more free time. Another thing you should know about Crowley is that he is willing to protect Aziraphale from anything but is not so keen on the situation being the other way around. This was only part of the reason why he was hiding his current, pained, condition from the angel.  
Crowley stretched his legs out under the table and attempted, badly, to cover up his wince from his partner, “Do you have a preference of where we should go? Or just Alpha Centuri, angel?”

“You’re joking.”

“I’m not! Just us two, imagine it.”

“Crowley, you seem in no fit state to travel. Are you… Are you okay?” Aziraphale’s eyes glazed over with worry as he looked upon his friend, “You look uncomfortable, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you’re in pain. You can’t be in pain, can you…?”

“I can and. And… Look, I don’t know why but. I guess her upstairs wasn’t happy about me stopping time and such.” Crowley looked at his glass and tried to miracle up more alcohol but instead a pained groan escaped his lips, “and my miracle-ness currently isn’t working, at all.”

His hoped his glass would have refilled but Aziraphale instead got up, “we need to figure this out, are you mortal – human even – now?” He didn’t wait for Crowley to answer and was already heading for the door, forcing Crowley to run after him.

“Where are we going?”

“My bookshop. I need to… I need answers.”

That made Crowley stop dead in his tracks, “Oh no you don’t. We do not need to investigate this, Angel.”

“And why not? You’ve said it yourself; we have no sides now. It’s only us, just us two. If there is something- anything”

Crowley could see the fear in his angel’s eyes, they were supposed to be safe, not mortal. His human angel was thinking “what if they weren’t forever?” and that thought scared them both in equal measures. The thought of Aziraphale’s fear was enough to make him give in to the other’s wishes, “Fine! Fine, we will have a look at your shop to see if we can find anything but no farther; no contacting upstairs or anything. Are we clear?” 

This was met with an enthusiastic nod from the angel followed by a long string of babbled agreement that Crowley tuned out for the sake of his own sanity. He loved the angel, but sometimes he couldn’t stop that train of thought riding a track straight out of his mouth and into the ears of whoever was unfortunate enough to be in the immediate vicinity.

“Are you listening, fiend?” Aziraphale waved his hand in front of Crowley’s face, “I said, you need to drive. I don’t have a car and yours is right outside.”  
Crowley rolled his eyes at the nickname and then again at the request, at this rate they’d stay rolling forever from pure constant use. Not that he would complain at all about his angel needing his help, not that he thought of Aziraphale as his angel. 

“Fine, fine. Get in, angel, your shop awaits us.” He definitely didn’t open the car door with a flourish for Aziraphale’s sake. Although, his friend did turn back to that appealing shade of pink again. It must be returning as his semi-permanent state. 

At least they really did feel like a team for once as he got in the car beside Aziraphale and they set off towards the store to try and find answers for this mysterious ailment


	2. I Never Asked and Neither Should You

“I told you we wouldn’t find anything.” To say Crowley sounded irritable would be a complete understatement considering that he was currently leaning against the desk that Aziraphale was sat at in the back of his shop watching him read yet another misprinted Bible. Thou Shall Commit Adultery if he remembered those particular spine creases correctly, all the damn things looked the same anyway. A Bible was just a very dull way of rereading his old memories through someone else’s self-righteous eyes if you asked him – not that anyone ever did. 

“I told you, Crowley, patience is a vi-“

“Don’t you finish that sentence, angel. When was the last time you saw me being ‘virtuous’, huh? I’m a demon. We don’t do patience.”  
That comment earned said demon an unimpressed look from his angelic counterpart, causing only a very brief break in the current reading activity. That expression when from exasperated to worried when Aziraphale managed to catch Crowley uncomfortably shifting how he was lent against the desk, “are you quite sure you don’t want a chair? You look awfully uncomfortable.”

“Maybe I’m just too sober to consider demonic mortality?” Crowley suggested as casually as he possibly could considering the situation, “maybe you should have refilled my glass rather than taking off on this- this wild goose chase, looking for something that you will never find!” He hadn’t meant to start shouting but might as well go with it now.

The worried look didn’t flee from Aziraphale’s eyes but he did let out a long sigh before placing down his book carefully, “I do understand that this must be altogether quite frustrating for you, Crowley, but I do find it unwise to drink large quantities of alcohol while we are unsure of what state you are currently in.”  
Crowley made the loudest, most frustrated, groan he could muster before flopping into an armchair and flicking through a first edition copy of A Study in Scarlet, not that he actually planned to read any of it. Sometimes that easiest way of getting Aziraphale’s attention was to pretend to read one of his beloved books, he gets all flustered about it a lot of the time.

Neither supernatural being moved from their allotted chairs for the next five or so hours, Crowley actually fell asleep in his at around the third hour. Not completely unusual for Crowley but still rather worrying for the angelic caretaker that had been watching him sleep. Aziraphale was aware that his companion had slept through most of the nineteenth century, although he wished that had worked eased his mind at all.

It wasn’t until the early hours of the next morning that Aziraphale had the heart to wake Crowley from his peaceful sleep, partially to make sure that it was possible for him to wake up at all. Never in his over 6000 years of existence did he think he would ever be so worried about the old snake to such an extent. If this was part of God’s ineffable plan, then he wanted nothing to do with it.

Crowley groaned quietly when Aziraphale gently shook him awake, “What do you want, angel?”

“Well, Crowley, I was just checking what you would… that you could…”

“What?”, Crowley cracked one lizard-like eye open to look at the other man’s concerned expression, “that I could wake up?”

Silence very quickly descended among them, unspoken truths of the situation suddenly becoming evident on Aziraphale’s face. He believes Crowley was going to die and Crowley himself couldn’t even find it within him to come up with an argument. Perhaps his angel had found something in one of those books, not that he had much hope on that outcome. Hope was in even shorter supply than it was when they spoke of attempting (and, in all fairness, succeeded at) stopping the apocalypse. At least with the apocalypse they knew what they were up against.

“You woke me up, might as well give me the bad news, how fast am I dying according to those books of yours?”

Aziraphale looked more than a little uncomfortable at the question, even taking to standing up so that he could go back to his desk and started flicking through the pages of some unmarked leather-bound book, “well, you see, I haven’t really… I’m not altogether sure… I have nothing, Crowley. Not a single written word on the matter. Not in non-fiction at the very least.” 

“Have you tried fiction then?” with complete certainty, Crowley knew the suggestion was beyond idiotic, but anything sounds cool if he says it so sounding stupid wasn’t really within his range of worries. It was definitely far below fear of certain death.

Nothing filled Crowley’s damned soul with hope more than the light that had returned in his angel’s eyes upon hearing his words. In this particular instance, Aziraphale didn’t bother to address the suggestion verbally before rushing off into the front area of that fire hazard he calls a shop, presumably to search for fictional books covering demonic death and ailments. The long night seemed to already be evolving into a much longer day. With an exasperated groan of disapproval, Crowley followed him to help look. 

The second he stepped through the doorway out of the backroom of the shop, his legs gave beneath him with a lightening bolt of pain. He barely felt himself hit the floor; vision blacked out from the shock. For a second, he forgot how to breathe. 

“Crowley?! Can you hear me?” the distant voice of his angel cut through the haze to reach him. Part of him was vaguely aware of Aziraphale leaning over him, trying to shake him back to full consciousness and talking, half the words lost in the haze.

“I’m fine… Angel, I’m okay…” even to Crowley’s ears the words sounded forged in forced calmness. In reality, he just didn’t like hearing Aziraphale so scared. He hadn’t heard the angel so scared since… well, since the end of the world. 

Much to his surprise, he wasn’t greeted with argument or anger or even panic, but instead a soft chuckle and Aziraphale’s fingers combing through his hair, “I’m sure you are. Why don’t you just go back to sleep, you old snake.”

As suspicious as the sudden change in attitude made Crowley (and that was an immeasurable amount of suspicion), sleep did sound good at that moment in time and he allowed the darkness to consume his awareness once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With College and such happening, I haven't had much time to write. I promise to get more to you all soon, hope you enjoy it!
> 
> As usual, comment and such as I do love to hear what you think of my writing.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first posted fanfiction and my first entry to bad things happen bingo! My friend has kindly beta’d this but please still leave feedback, I’d love to know what people think.


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